Who likes Lackey?

About the author

Joe Palladino is a life-long Waterbury resident. He has worked in the newspaper business for the past 25 years, for the last nine with the Republican-American, and the past six years he has been the local sports columnist.

8 thoughts on “Who likes Lackey?”

Maybe it is just me, but is the corny ‘Thumbs Up/Down’ waste of space in every Sunday’s edition (I know, I know, it’s written by very low-paid, very local and small-minded ‘writers’…) as biased against the World Champion Yankees as the MSM is against conservatism??? Get the facts straight before inking this garbage. You called Girardi ‘childish’ (ironic, huh?) for switching to #28 to symbolize next year’s goal, an act that takes big stones because of the high demands and expectations on the organization. Just imagine if Uncle Fester, er, Tito Francona wanted to do the same (single-digit # of course…), he would have easily been on the thumbs-up side of the ledger for showing ‘true leadership’ and ‘guts’ and the man who will cure cancer and AIDS. The FACTS are that Granderson was asked if he still wanted #28 before it was given to Girardi. Granderson, deferred, and was actually excited to go back to his little league #14 which he wore out of respect for his father who wore #14 in his softball leagues. And he did not wear #28 his whole career, as conveniently misstated as he came up wearing #19 with the Tigers. But, as usual, the Rep-Am gets what it pays for when it comes to quality, accurate, and unbiased sports coverage.

The glaring difference between Morris and Lackey is innings. Morris averaged 7.33 innings per start for his entire 18-year career, including an average of 11 complete games a year. Lackey only averages 6.44 innings per start in his much shorter career. Going deep into and finishing games is what made Morris unique and there are really only a handful of pitchers today that can be compared to him like Halliday, Sabathia, Santana and Webb. The value of a guy who can give your bullpen a rest every 5 days is huge. While Lackey is a very good pitcher, but not great, he actually compares more favorably to MATT Morris. Jack Morris was always a staff leader on some otherwise mediocre teams while averaging 16 wins per year. Morris was a clear leader on the teams that he brought to championships. Lackey has only (by comparison) averaged 15 wins per year on a superb team his whole 8-year career.

Hey heres Johnny it’s amazing to me that a person with such high sports intelligence (referring to Lackey vs Morris) makes such ignorant comments about rep-am staff. I don’t ever remember any rep-am staff writer calim to be Peter Gammons…….and they certainly work on a smaller budget. the bottom line is that this guys go to work everyday and work hard and what they do and have a true passion for it. How dare you make such a personal attack. I sure you carry a few flaws in your line of work. How would you like it if you had had to listen to some random Joe moan about it.

Rep-am staff, thank you for being my #1 sports page for the last 31 years.

Thank you Joe and Jeff for furthering my point about childish printed attacks. The huge difference between my printed criticism and the Rep-Am’s sports staff criticisms is that mine only appeared in a sparsely-read online blog where the Rep-Am’s (Joe’s) attack (calling a class act like Joe Girardi ‘childish’) appeared in a widely-read publication, the ultimate bully pulpit where writers’ biased opinions get printed as fact. The attack on Mr. Girardi was not only unwarranted, but contained factual errors to boost that opinionated criticism. That is irresponsible journalism at its worst.

The Rep-Am is distributed evenly in a Yankees/Red Sox market but constantly contains biased attacks against the Yankees because the paid writers are Red Sox and Orioles fans. Journalistic integrity should not take a hit because of personal preferences. The Hartford Courant is much closer to Red Sox territory yet provides its readership with the best Yankees coverage in the state. Its pretty sad when an otherwise integrity-challenged publication like the Courant actually has more integrity in its unbiased sports coverage.

Again, my point regarding the bully pulpit that the paid print writers enjoy makes any criticisms of my online lobs hypocritical at best. Good day gentlemen.

Any opportunity to help further your point is what I am all about. With your help, perhaps someday I might also be a savvy media analyst. I especially liked the “good day gentlemen.” Now that is stylish.

As always, best wishes from – how did you phrase it? – a very low-paid, very local, and small-minded writer. Gosh you’re clever. I can only hope…